My husband and I were recently interviewed by a local radio station. The interview ran quite long, so it got chopped up a bit and is being broadcast in sections. Two of these can be heard from this link (podcast dates 5/13/13 and 5/20/13.)

The older podcast was the start of the interview, with Gabriel discussing bikes. After we'd been talking a while the interviewer shifted the focus to clothing: this is the material in the 5/20 podcast. (I naturally made sure that I worked in a mention of my upcoming book!)

Another fun piece about bicycles, transcribed from an antique ladies' magazine.

The Evolution of a SportGodey’s Magazine, 1897

Man lives in the present, revels in the future, and occasionally recalls the past, notwithstanding that in the latter there is much that is keenly interesting, much that is highly instructive. Of the hundreds of thousands who now ride bicycles, how few there are who know of its history, its birth, its growth, its struggles, and its final and far-reaching triumph! Not many really care, perhaps, but for all of that, there are few who will not exhibit at least a show of interest in almost anything which pertains to that which has become so much a part of our daily life that it can well afford to rank as a wonder of the final quarter of the nineteenth century... In 1865 Pierre Lallemont, a Frenchman, exhibited a bicycle with the cranks and pedals attached to the front wheel, which was also the larger of the two. Previous to that time, the front wheel had always been the smaller. Lallemont’s invention was the forerunner of the “ordinary” or high bicycle, which was so familiar and in such general use twenty years later. In 1868 the rubber tire was introduced, and other improvements followed in time. It was not until 1876, however, that a bicycle, in the general acceptance of the term, was seen in America, and not until the following year that an American, A.D. Chandler, of Boston, was in actual possession of one. The Englishmen were quicker to realize the advantages of the wheel, and for a time all bicycles used in America were of English make. In 1878, however, a sewing machine company in Hartford, Conn., undertook their manufacture, on a small scale, of course. That it was not a gold mine may be imagined from the fact that one year later the sales of bicycles in this country had reached a total of exactly ninety-two. In November, 1879, there were, by actual census, easily taken, just thirty-five wheels in New York City. A club had been organized during the previous year and a bicycle race run. These attracted notice, and slowly but surely the bicycle crept into favor. There were stumbling-blocks at every corner, however. The “new-fangled thing” frightened horses, nurse-maids, and old women, and was voted a menace to public safety. The law-maker legislated against it, and the common citizen damned it most vigorously. Even as late as 1881 three wheelmen were arrested for daring to ride in Central Park, in New York City. This arrest, however, proved an opening wedge. There were then some one hundred bicycle clubs scattered throughout the country, and the hue and cry that arose resulted in the park authorities removing certain of the restrictions. Cyclists were permitted within the confines of the park after they had proved their proficiency and had been awarded a brass badge, attesting to the fact, by the Park Commissioners... Until 1886 the high wheel was in general use. The previous year - recall Dalziel’s invention and note how history repeats itself - a low-built bicycle, driven by chain-power, had made its appearance in England, and naturally found its way to this country. It met with immediate disfavor and when, in 1887, a woman’s bicycle was invented by a Washingtonian, the roar that went up... proved such a shock to the public that it was years before it recovered. But it did recover, as all the world now knows. It is useless to delve deeper into history. The safety, slowly at first, and then with a rush that was amazing, found its way into such favor that the high wheel was soon almost wholly obliterated. The pneumatic tire - invented by a veterinary surgeon, J.B. Dunlop, of Belfast, Ireland - came out in 1889, and completed the “death” of the “ordinary,” although, as a matter of fact, it was not until 1893 that the air tire was fully understood and was in general use. About the time that the safety bicycle was introduced, interest in cycling was on the wane. The high wheel was hardly a practical machine for all round purposes and for all ages and conditions of men. From its very nature its use must be limited. The low wheel came in at about the proper moment, and was followed by a revival of flagging interest. It was not, however, until the pneumatic tire became known that cycling can be said to have had a really permanent foundation, and to no one other invention is due the present happy condition of things. The new tire wrought a great change in the construction of bicycles, reducing their average weight from fifty to twenty-three pounds; it abridged distances, completely upsetting the old tables of records - witness that it has reduced the mile record from 2:22 3/5 to 1:40 3/5; it permitted travel on streets and roads previously thought unridable, and added to cycling a degree of ease and comfort never dreamed of. Yet how few know how much of this is due to the insistence of an eight-year old boy, Inventor Dunlop’s son? It is true that as early as 1845 an Englishman named Thompson patented an inflated tire designed for use on wagons, but this was never utilized. It does not appear to have been known to Mr. Dunlop at the time he was experimenting. In simple fashion, he has put the story of his invention in writing, a story which has but seldom seen the light. “In 1885,” says he, “I bought a tricycle for my only son, John, who was then eight years of age. For a few years previous to that I had been thinking of spring wheels, with the object of reducing vibration, and rendering the propulsion of vehicles comparatively easy.” “John often complained of the ‘roughness’ or ‘shaking’ he experienced on his tricycle, especially over sets. I understood that spring steel was not reliable in spokes or rims of spring wheels, and I knew that htere was a loss of power in heavy rubber tires. I formed the opinion that compressed air contained in a thin, strong, flexible, non-expansible jacket or tube, and applied to the outside of a wheel, would be the best means for increasing speed and reducing vibration of cycles, etc. I told John that I could make the fastest and easiest running machine that had ever been made. “I was exceedingly busy in the practice of my profession, but John often urged me to have a machine or wheels made according to my ideas. I was anxious to gratify his ardent wishes; besides, I had an ambition to produce a fast machine. I therefore resolved to have an experiment tried. About the end of 1887, or beginning of 1888, I procured two thin strips of American elm about three inches broad, which I bent and formed into rims. I also ordered a few yards of sheet rubber, one-thirty-second of an inch thick, and rubber solution, and bought a few yards of strong Drogheda linen. Out of these we made two air-tubes and tires complete, and secured same to the wooden rims. The tread surface of the canvas tube was covered with two or three layers of the sheet rubber, and a single layer was used near the rims. As we had no workshop these operations were carried on by John and myself in a bed-room seldom used. “The rims and tires were then suspended round the driving-wheels of the tricycle by means of wires. I did not use an air-tire in the front wheel, because the forks were too narrow, and I had no means of altering them. “It would take too long a time to describe how these tires were the subject of ridicule and laughter. However, they realized our expectations, and I resolved to have a better tricycle fitted with air-tires. “When the rubber makers were requested to make the air-tubes, they replied to their Belfast agent that they had been asked to make many absurd things before, but this was the most absurd and impracticable idea they had ever heard of. The agent wrote them again to make the air-tubes, and informed them that the idea was not impracticable, as a pair of such tires were actually in regular use. The bicycle was regularly ridden during the winter, in order to test the tires.” Thereafter young and old, high and low, male and female caught the infection, until to-day the man or woman who would deride the bicycle would be at once, and rightly, set down as a dyspeptic crank. The wonderful demand for bicycles which developed during 1895 - a demand so great and wholly unexpected that the bicycle factories of this country, working night and day, could not supply it - is not without parallel. Indeed, the history of the bicycle in America can best be likened to a series of great waves, this, of course, assuming that the curious and fantastic two-wheeled and man-propelled vehicles of the distant past may with propriety be termed “bicycles.” The first wave reached its greatest height in 1819. Quotations from a publication of that year state that “excitable citizens were in an ecstasy of astonishment and delight over the introduction of the ‘dandy horses,’” and that “the manufacturers could not apparently meet the demand of the ‘velocipeders.’” As with all waves, this receded, and “the people who had purchased machines at great prices gave them away as playthings to grown-up boys.” In 1868 - 69 another cycling wave precipitated itself on these shores and swept the country from end to end. The velocipede factories worked overtime but could not equal the demand; “riding academies” were over-numerous; “velocipede receptions” were nightly occurences and attracted the fashionable element. At one of the “receptions,” it is recorded that “Among the gentlemen who gave proof of their skill was Charles A. Dana, who is an expert rider.” This reprint from a record of 1868 is of unusual interest at this time and shows how closely history has repeated and is repeating itself: “Several months have passed since we heard of a two-wheeled contrivance, called ‘bicircle’ or ‘veloce’ by which it was possible for an active Frenchman to traverse ten miles of the streets of Paris in a single hour. The fever which raged so high there seems to have broken out in America. Schools for the instruction of velocipede-riding are being opened. Youngsters ride down Fifth Avenue with their school-books strapped in front of their velocipedes, and expert riders cause crowds of spectators to visit the public squares, which afford excellent tracks for the light wheels to move swiftly over. The Rev. Henry Ward Beecher has secured two of the American machines, and other gentlemen, well known in the literary and artistic world, are possessed of their magic circles. One of them takes his ride of nearly ten miles daily, and saves time as well as enjoying the ride. A number of persons are already making use of the velocipede as a means of traversing the distance between their homes and places of business. Professional inventors are now loboring to bring it to American completeness, and the few dealers in New York are doing quite a driving business. Their prices range from $60 to $100, about the same as in France. The weight of a medium sized machine is about sixty pounds, and the size of driving-wheel most in favor from thirty to thirty-six inches. The winter season is not favorable to veloce-riding, but with the opening of spring we may expect to see the two-wheeled affairs gliding gracefully about the streets and whizzing swiftly through the smooth roads of Central Park.” Whether it is proper to term the 1895 demand a wave is, of course, open to serious question. If it is, it certainly has not reached its height. The greatly increased outputs of the various factories, and the intense displayed by the public in the several cycle shows of the past few months, make this appear certain. That is not a “wave,” that it will not recede, that the present demand is not a “craze” nor a “mania,” there is abundant reason to believe. That the sudden and sky-rockety increase last year was unnatural is generally admitted. That the business will continue to grow is certain, but that it must settle down to a strictly commercial basis is equally true. Let not the bicycle be confounded or too closely linked with the so-called “motocycle” [sic]- a general inclination of this time. The two vehicles are too disimilar in purpose and in accomplishment to be placed in the same class. It is the bicycle, the vehicle propelled by human energy, that is making the world better and healthier and more contented, and which deserves the praise. It has abridged distance - which accomplishment, the sages say, is second only to the invention of the alphabet - but better still, perhaps, it is making a happier and healthier people. It has, to an extent, broken down the barrier between classes, and has contributed to the home circle a means of contentment by which there may be a more nearly equal division of the joys, a division which may be shared by father and son, by mother and daughter. Every revolution of the pedals means a breath of new air, an infusion of new blood, a quickening of the energies, a bettering of the mind, a bettering of the body; all of which have a direct bearing on the affairs of home and business. The bicycle has brought the world one step closer to Nature.

The following article was transcribed from an antique ladies' magazine. It is a wonderful reminder that roads were paved not for automobiles, but for and by cyclists!

The Work of Wheelmen for Better RoadsIsaac B. PotterGodey’s Magazine, 1897

“When a man rides a bicycle he begins to study the face of the earth.” The novelty of riding a vehicle of which the rider is himself the propelling power is in many ways an instructive one. The experience is delightful or dangerous; easy or irksome; inspiring or tiresome, and the pace of the rider is rapid or slow, just in proportion to the effort required to keep the vehicle in motion. And since this effort depends in a marked degree on the condition of the surface over which the bicycle is propelled, it has come to pass that the cyclist of to-day is tolerably familiar with the road question, and his familiar knowledge has been gained in that best of all schools - the school of experience. He knows, indeed, what all the horses and all the mules knew thousands of years ago, with the added advantage of being able to tell about it. The only beast that was ever known to speak is said to have called Balsam’s attention to the bad going. Every wheelman who talks for good roads tells the story that every horse would tell, and has the happy satisfaction of voicing the sentiment, not only of millions of his fellows, but of millions of dumb and patient brutes that have become galled and wind-broken and spavined and foundered and mangy in the service of millions of thoughtless and selfish masters, who, with an almost communistic fervor, are perpetually trying to dodge the road-tax. And this leads me to say, in passing, that a tax is not a think got be afraid of; it is the tribute which savagery pays to civilization; the entrance-fee to community life; the price we pay for the privilege of living together, and for the right to fly a national flag. The wheelmen of America have considered these things, and have thought out and wrought out many problems which have seemed to impede the movement for better roads. They have formed a “League of American Wheelmen,” an organization now in its sixteenth year, whose main object is “to facilitate touring and to secure improvement in the condition of the public roads and highways.” The history of this League is a vastly interesting one. It began as a fraternity of young men banded together for mutual protection and for the attainment of the right to travel upon the public roads and parkways. Having, at the end of bitter opposition, accomplished these ends, the officers of the League, about eight years ago, took up the work of agitating the question of better roads. Many members of the League had travelled on their wheels over the splendid roads of France, Switzerland, Germany, and the British Isles, and knew of the wonderful internal development which good roads had brought to all of the great countries of Europe. When Mr. Blaine was made Secretary of State in 1889, a letter was sent to him at Washington by the Highway Improvement Committee of the League, suggesting that our consuls, ministers, and representatives at the principal cities of Europe be directed to report at length concerning the various methods of making and maintaining public roads in the various counties in which they were officially located. Mr. Blaine, with his usual sagacious foresight, immediately acted upon this suggestion, and in 1891 there was issued from the Government Printing Office at Washington, a bound volume of Special Consular Reports on the subject of “Streets and Highways in Foreign Countries,” comprising nearly six hundred printed pages and copiously illustrated. The distribution of these reports did much to stimulate the movement in the United States, and in the fall of the same year the League of American Wheelmen established the Good Roads Magazine, an illustrated monthly publication, of which, during the three years of its existence, more than a million copies were distributed throughout the United States. Meanwhile the several State Divisions of the League had given active attention to the subject, and in all the more populous States, Highway Improvement Committees were appointed and set at work. In many States highway improvement legislation was attempted, and in some it has been successful. In Massachusetts, the new system of highway construction under the provision of the State Highway Commission, has been highly successful, and the system there adopted suggests many features that might be copied with advantage by other States. The three members of the Massachusetts Commission are Hon. George A. Perkins, of Boston, an ex-member of the Massachusetts Legislature, Professor N.S. Shaler, of Harvard University, and William E. McClinstock, a skilled road engineer, all men of undoubted fitness, as the result of their work has shown, and all members of the League of American Wheelmen. In New Jersey the construction of improved roads through Union, Essex, and other counties, was largely the result of agitation begun by the wheelmen, and the adoption of the excellent Highway laws now in force in that State was brought about by the direct influence of wheelmen in the legislative halls at Trenton. It is sometimes urged by thoughtless people that the interest of wheelmen in the improvement of the public roads is a purely selfish one, and that the public at large should not be taxed for the purpose of constructing roads for the convenience of bicycle riders; but most of this sort of argument runs to sophistry and works its own destruction. Bicycle riding is neither a trade, a profession, nor an industrial occupation. A million people in the United States are to-day the owners and possessors of bicycles, and the time is soon to arrive when it will be no more proper to speak of a man as a “bicycle rider” because he occasionally rides a wheel, than it would be to style one a “carriage rider” who finds frequent occasion to drive his horse over the public roads. The wheelmen of the United States include men engaged in all the learned professions, in all branches of trade, manufacture, and commerce, and they include thousands of farmers whose acquaintance with the bicycle has induced a more useful and intimate acquaintance with the miserable condition of the public roads, over which they and their fathers and grandfathers have dragged their weary way for more than a century. There is really but one argument on the good roads question, and that is the argument in their favor. We all know, in the first place, that we are have never had really good going. We may as well admit that these country roads are about as bad as roads can possibly be; that they are frost-laden and wet, and soft and soggy in spring and fall; dry and dusty in summer, and rough the year around. These roads are all out-doors, in plain sight; everybody knows they are bad, and every honest man will admit it. As farmers, let us admit that these bad roads keep us from town and from each other; that we can’t get to market when prices are good; that we are hauling scant loads, racking our wagons, killing our horses, and rasping our tempers; that they keep our wives shut up like cattle in a pen; that they increase our solitude, keep our children from school, and send our young men to the cities with a solemn oath upon their lips that they will never till the soil. Last year our railroads carried a thousand million tons of freight. Every year the amount increases. Every pound of this freight is carted and carried over our streets and roads before it gets to the railroad. Million os tons more are hauled in wagons and sold in the country towns and consumed by the local buyer. Here is the farmer’s end of it: hay, fifty-four million tons. Think of it! ... - ninety million tons of potatoes; two million tons of cotton; total, one hundred and fifty-two million tons, not counting the mud on the wagon wheels. Five hundred million dollars paid for farm implements and machinery to harvest it. Twelve hundred millions invested in farm horses and mules to drag it to market. Think of it! Think of waiting for the mud to “dry up.” Sixteen million horses and mules idle in the stable. Four million dollars a day for the horse feed; twenty-eight millions a week. Think of the loss of time and labor; the dwarfed and shrunken value of our farms; of the slack supply and good prices when the roads are impassable; think of the procession of farmers that rush to town and glut the market in the first days of dry weather, and think of the paltry prices they get when everybody is trying to sell to an overstocked merchant. And so the wheelmen are trying to encourage the movement for better roads, not only because good roads are needed for bicycle riding, but because they are needed by everybody. Every improvement is a herald of prosperity; every good country road increases the value of every farm that fronts it. Raise the value of real estate on American farms five per cent, and you make our farms richer by six hundred and fifty millions of dollars. Put a like increase on the value of farm products, live stock, and farm machinery and you gain three hundred and fifty millions more. Decrease the cost of hauling one year’s crop of hay, cereals, potatoes, tobacco, and cotton, by only ten cents per ton, and you save fifteen millions of dollars. A good road, therefore, is a splendid investment. There never was a good road made in any civilized country on earth that didn’t pay a hundred percent a year on its cost. It raises the value of every acre, invites us to market when prices are good, and takes us out of the clutches of the commission pirates who sell our goods behind our backs at their own figures, keep their own accounts, and pay us a pittance for our toil and trouble. A good road shortens distance, saves time, wagons, horse-flesh, and harnesses, increases the load and lessens the burden, and makes it possible to haul two tons to market with the same power that now leaves one ton stuck in the mire. And good roads bring us closer together, drive out the gloom, make neighbors of hermits, discount every farm mortgage, and bring joy and contentment to every community. Imagine a man, knee-deep in the mud, trying to look cheerful! ... If, therefore, the wheelmen are seeking to divert the efforts of our statesmen into a new and promising field, should they not have substantial encouragement? Years of experience have taught them the lessons of fortitude, and they have been repelled too often not to understand that a lost battle is not a lost victory. The year 1896 finds the League with a larger membership than ever before, a membership that grows with the growth of wheeling, and that promises in the near future to make the subject of better roads a political issue, and to declare a platform from which the more or less important but well-worn question of a tariff on tomato-cans will give place to one of greater public concern."